Nationalist strongman Vladimir Putin meets Lionel Barbour editor of the liberal globalist Financial Times. And as the venue is the heavily fortified palace of the Kremlin, Mr Barber is on his best behaviour: no interrupting or haranguing his host for his notorious breaches of the international rules-based order.
‘The liberal idea has become obsolete’ ran the subsequent FT headline, with a front-page image of Putin in cold and calculating facade. Choice quotes confirmed the pariah status of the Russian leader who accused Western governments of self-destruction. For example, he denounced Angela Merkel’s ‘cardinal mistake’ of inviting over a million migrants to Germany in one year, endangering a peaceful and law-abiding society.
Liberalism, according to Putin, ‘has come into conflict with the interests of the overwhelming majority of the population’. Virtue-signalling Western leaders have pursued a policy of ‘mindless multiculturalism’ that is making countries unrecognisable and dangerous. ‘Migrants can kill, plunder and rape with impunity because their rights as migrants have to be protected’. Putin would probably doubt the meaning of cultural enrichment to sexually harassed women in Swedish and German cities. And is the danger of a repeat cycle of suicide bombings a figment of right-wing imagination?
President for almost twenty years, the former KGB officer is widely revered in a country humiliated by the fall of communism. He has restored its pride, irrespective of its economic problems and a curtailment of liberties. While concerns about freedom of expression are justifiable, Putin’s casting as an authoritarian ogre is ironic, given the widening chasm between the political establishment and people in our European democracies. Indeed, is it not cheeky to criticise him as anti-democratic, when the FT has constantly opposed the result of the British referendum to leave the EU?
Liberal publications such as Time, Atlantic, the Guardian and Economist constantly warn of the threat to ‘liberal democracy’. But it is not Brexit that is undemocratic; it is the desperate efforts of a supposedly enlightened political and cultural establishment to thwart it. It was not the election of Donald Trump that was undemocratic; it was the subsequent concerted reaction against him, exploiting institutional power and prejudice. It seems that democracy is fundamental, but only if the result is liberal.
Weary of unfounded allegations that Russia manipulated the US election, Putin reminded the FT that Trump won fairly and squarely. He did so by tapping into ordinary people’s resentment of the callous globalism of Washington administrators, a smug intelligentsia that dismisses most of the country as ‘flyover states’, uncontrolled mass immigration, imposition of secular values and subversive identity politics. Unlike Holy Russia, the West has abandoned its Christian heritage and biblical teaching, with a predictable outcome.
One of Putin’s biggest crimes was to support the Baathist government in Syria. There is no easy answer to turmoil in the Middle East, but privately many Westminster politicians think we backed the wrong side. No civilised person will excuse the use of chemical weapons against civilians be it in Damascus or Salisbury, while in preventing sedition, Assad may be guilty of crimes against humanity. But as a real-world strategist Putin knew that Syria was at risk of descending into chaos – which is exactly what happened when Western governments drew a red line and committed to futile military action against a sovereign state.
As shown by a recent Hansard Society survey in the UK, people in Western liberal democracies pine for a strong leader. Liberalism was fine in the mostly peaceful decades after the Second World War, when capitalism spread wealth globally and funded expanding welfare systems, but the progressive elite’s ideal of a borderless world defies common sense. Having rescued a disintegrating nation, Putin understands the basic human need for security in mind and matter. Dastardly deeds apart, Western politicians should learn from his commitment and courage of conviction to put Russian people first.
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Wow, superb blog layout! Hoow long have you evwr been running
a blog for? you made running a blog look easy. The entire glance of your weeb
sie is fantastic, as neatly as the content!
The FT used to be a serious journal featuring well-thought-out pieces on business and finance. Under Barber, it has become an extended petulant and intemperate rant about Leaver xenophobes who (allegedly) don’t understand economics. The elderly white males who write the articles are all pushing for no borders and more mass immigration Ponzi schemes in furtherance of their globalist, urban elite objectives. A few sensible writers, such as John Kay and Lucy Kellaway, are in a small minority.
Back in the 60s and 70s it was often said the FT was staffed by Communist Party economics grads. So, as the EU is arguably the USSR minus tanks, maybe they’re still there.
The story of Putin launching a poisoned gas attack on Britain is an obvious fake. To believe it, you have extra-gullible.
Putin’s support to the Baathist government in Syria is the best thing that has happened to Syrians since the beginning of the civil war in the country. Yes, this government does not stand up to Western standards of democracy. But the only real alternative to it was an ISIS government. Would it better meet Western democratic standards?
Let us not forget that Syria is a predominantly Islamic country. Islam is incompatible with democracy. There is not a single Muslim country that could be called democratic. And there will never be.
The best regime possible in such a country is secular authoritarian. Assad’s government allows Christians and other religious minorities to survive and practice their religion legally. Moreover, many of them have high standards of living and a few occupy important government posts. If Assad falls, Syrian Christians will be in the same horrible situations as Iraqi ones are after the fall of Saddam.
Do Christian lives matter? I am afraid that for the political leaders of the West they don’t. At least, Christian lives matter for them far less than the abstract ideal of “democracy”. That is why they blithely condone the holocaust of Christians (and a few other minorities) in the Middle East and fall into a rage over Putin’s attempt to put an end to this genocide.
Come off it. Even the Russians thought the goons reciting of the Guide to Salisbury Cathedral comic. Caught red handed.
Your other observations have unbearable truth in them – even free elections would not save any Muslim majority country from horror – except Iran, or Persia as my escaped female students insisted it was called. Saddam protected the last handful of Jews in Bagdad (from around 40% of the Bagdad population 100 years ago). Islam has terrific appeal to men whom outnumber women in Islamic countries for reasons best not looked for – it sanctions violence to protect clerical male rule and encourages sexual licence following the founder’s example. One of my Saud students said the clerics there are still pushing for the age of consent to be lowered to primary school age (despite being formally 18 – ignored of course). God knows what’s in it for women – except the Irma Grese type who surfaced among ISIS and who flog young women in Iran and Saud for the pleasure of perverted judges.
There is nothing in it for woman – but if they don’t obey, they get beaten in the home and outside.
That’s Iran and Saud and the like, certainly. But here and in the US and Europe? There are Muslim women in the Tory Party including some in parliament complaining about ‘islamophobia’ – despite the being bogus Muslim brotherhood terrorist propaganda. So I wonder if we’re missing something. 100 years ago there were women who opposed the vote and other civil rights – is there some factor like that, inexplicable and beyond understanding, at work I wonder.
Saddam protected not only Jews, but also Gypsies – he was fond of Gypsy music. After his fall, the Arab neighbours destroyed the Gypsy quarter of Baghdad and chased out its inhabitants (or did they kill the Gypsies? I don’t remember).
Whatever the atrocities committed by the Saddam regime, the atrocities committed by various actors of violence in Iraq as the country descended into anarchy under the tutelage of its US ‘liberators’ has been far worse. Now, 18 years after the ‘liberation’, the country is still a bloody shambles.
The liberation was well-intentioned but uninformed about the nature of Islam and it’s implacable opposition to democracy and justice. Those who knew Muslims through work had no idea the depth of the chasm between us. There was a time – a happy time – when most of us knew nothing about islam. Even in the 70s hippies tripped to Afghan and found a welcome and failed to notice the gulf between them and us.
There is no excuse for ignorance now and the Tory appeasement of Islam is shameful and, I think, fatal for future.
Putin is no more a strong man than Assad or Erdogan – a bunch of cowards afraid of opposition and free elections relying on well-rewarded thugs to keep them safe. If they have popular support, so what? and so much the worse for countries whose people (men we’re talking about) admire such behaviour.
Irrelevant that he happens to be right about the West deluding itself about immigration from countries which have no discernible ethical standards in their traditions or faiths.